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FOUR men and a woman who were behind a land investment fraud I warned against seven years ago have finally been convicted and jailed following an investigation by Merseyside Police.
The gang set up two companies, Land Banking UK plc and Land Strategy Limited, which claimed to own fields that were ripe for development. They sold housesized plots as investments with the tale that their value would rocket when planning permission was granted for 400 new homes. One site, at Redditch, offered plots for £19,120 with a predicted return of £143,000.
Ringleader Timothy Wren, 39, was sentenced to eight years in prison. Jack Chandler, 59, got seven years and his wife Jeanette, 60, was jailed for four years. Kevin Hilton, 40, was sentenced to six years and Alfred Arthur, 56, to four years. All were convicted of conspiracy to defraud. Police say more than 300 investors lost £3million.
I interviewed sales boss Jack Chandler in 2009 when he explained how he hoped to sidestep investor protection laws that would have applied if plots were sold with a pledge to apply for planning consent thrown in.
Instead, the company would keep a plot for itself, make an application to develop it and then other plot owners could join in. The reality was different. Merseyside Police fraud investigator Clive Myerscough said: ‘They played on people’s trust, telling investors a pack of lies about the possible resale value of the land which couldn’t have been further from the truth.’
He added that gang members ‘lived a life of luxury on the back of their crimes’. Prosecutors are now hoping to win court orders for confiscation of assets.